billpalmer.net

Has Apple lost its mind? Well, maybe not.

Let me see if I have this straight. By far, the biggest potential problem with Apple moving the Mac to Intel-based processors is the fact that some geek moron would figure out how to run Windows natively on a Mac and then publish a step by step process on how to do it, thus effectively allowing users to turn their Intel-based Mac into just another useless Windows box, and rendering the Mac platform nonexistent. But instead of finding an innovative way to keep this from happening and averting doom, Apple has instead released a software patch that allows you just go ahead and install Windows without batting an eyelash. Has Apple gone certifiably insane? Is it time to lock up Steve and the gang in a rubber room for their own safety and protection? Is doomsday upon us?

Well, maybe not.

It's tough to look at this one objectively, because I find the idea of this "BootCamp" software incredibly distasteful. So much so that the thought of it makes me literally want to vomit. And I know that most of you are having the same reaction. That's because it is distasteful. It's disgusting. If you don't find this offensive as a Mac user, then I don't want to know you. Starting soon, some people who "switch" to the Mac are going to continue using Windows, and I'm not talking about occasionally firing it up for this or that oddball software title. I'm talking about using Windows full-time, as if MacOS X weren't even installed, as if it didn't even exist. After installing Windows within minutes of first firing up their new Mac, some of them will never get around to going back to MacOS X for anything. Some of the stupider ones will even believe that they are in fact "using a Mac" by using Windows on Mac hardware, just because they bought the computer from Apple, mistakenly believing that Macs are Windows-based just like all the crappy computers on the market that they're used to.

Much as I'd like to think that there can't possibly be anyone on that planet that stupid, I'm reminded of the fact that some of the smartest people I know suddenly become some of the stupidest people I know, the minute the topic of computers enters the conversation. These people don't know the difference between Mac and Windows, they've managed to confuse themselves out of ever being able to understand the difference, and no amount of explanation will ever cure them of that. They're not going to buy a Mac because they already know that it's "not Windows." Except now they are going to buy a Mac, because they can continue to use Windows.

I find the whole thing patently offensive. And yet I have to applaud Apple for having the guts to do it.

I'm reminded of the landscape back in mid-2002, when Apple had to make the decision whether or not to officially make the iPod available to Windows users. At the time I didn't favor the idea because I was concerned that if Windows users no longer had to buy a Mac in order to get their hands on an iPod, it would be a disincentive for them to switch to the Mac. In fact, at the time I foresaw a number of problems in opening up the iPod to the Windows universe. I feared FireWire would eventually be pushed by the wayside in favor of the inferior USB 2.0. I worried that people would install iTunes on their poorly functioning Windows boxes and then improperly blame Apple when iTunes couldn't perform any better in that bed of quicksand than any of the rest of their installed applications.

Just about everything I predicted that would go wrong ended up coming true. But what I didn't see at the time was that none of them would add up to be enough of a collective minus to cancel out the net positive gained by putting the iPod into the hands of millions of Windows users. In hindsight, it was a messy decision, one that cost us Mac users some things, but one that on the whole worked out really well for the Mac platform. Unless you think that the Mac's resulting 35 to 40 percent year over year unit growth is a bad thing.

And the kicker is that most CEO's would be perfectly willing to sit back and let the Mac grow at that impressive rate for awhile, seeing as how it's three times that of the rest of the computing industry. The Mac is in fact gaining marketshare, after all. But with today's move, it's clear that Steve Jobs is not willing to just sit back and collect new users one at a time in a clean and sterile environment. He wants them all, and he doesn't care how he gets them or just how messy it might get. Talk about aggressive.

Let's be clear here that there are two different potential types of Windows users who will be more inclined to buy a Mac when they find out that they can easily run Windows on it. There's the group of people who have been wanting to switch for awhile, but their workflow depends on one specific piece of specialized or otherwise obscure software that can only run on Windows. When they find out that they can run that one piece of software through Windows on a Mac at full speed, they'll go ahead and pull the trigger. But we know that this is a very small group of people, as there are just so few mainstream software titles that aren't available on the Mac. We're talking about a few small niches here, and to those folks I say hey, you know what you're doing, welcome to the Mac platform. You want to fire up Windows ten percent of the time, more power to you. I don't care.

But then there's everyone else. Windows users who use Windows because it's all they know, or in many cases because it's all they know of. Literally everything they're doing on Windows could be done at least as easily on a Mac, and their reasons for not considering a Mac boil down to a combination of misconception and fear. Tell these people that they can buy a Mac and keep using Windows, though, and now you've given Linus his proverbial security blanket. Nevermind that not a single one of them will ever have any legitimate reason to ever even think about defacing their Mac by installing Windows on it. They'll move to the Mac just because they know that they've got a safety net in place in case they can't figure out how to use a Mac. After all, most of what's wrong with (Windows-using) computer users is that they're too insecure about their potential inability to figure out how to do anything new.

Clearly Apple is banking on most of these folks feeling more secure in switching, and then once they've brought the Mac home and spent ten minutes with it, completely forgetting that the "revert to Windows" option even existed. This notion is helped in large part by the fact that even those who buy the Mac with the intention of downgrading it to Windows will suddenly realize that they're going to have to buy a retail copy of Windows XP in order to make it happen. And after shelling out for a new computer, turning around and going back to the store to spend another hundred-some bucks on unneeded software is about the last thing most folks want to do.

But man, there are going to be people who are going to insist on doing it anyway, just because they've been brainwashed into believing that you simply can't succeed on a computer unless you're using Windows. They'll misguidedly surf the web within Windows, check their email within Windows, pretty much continue functioning as a computing retard, despite the fact that they're using Mac hardware. Apple is setting itself up for a scenario where after having convinced these people to buy a Mac, Apple will then have to go back and convince those same people to switch to the Mac again by actually using it as a Mac. And despite the plain as day superiority of the interface and applications on the "Mac side" of their Mac, some folks never will be convinced to leave the "Windows side" of their Mac.

In other words, some folks will just be a lost cause. They'll throw away their money on a Mac just so they can run Windows a hundred percent of the time, having gained literally no advantage by having bought the Mac at all, other than having some pretty hardware to look at.

But let's forget about them, as those types are hopeless no matter what they're using. Instead, let's focus on everyone else in the middle, those folks who are trying to have a brain about it all, but they're simply torn between common sense and widely held misconception. They'll buy a Mac and then they'll wonder whether they should go back and buy Windows for it. Or they'll install Windows and then they'll wonder if they should keep using it as a crutch or take the leap to the Mac stuff. And Apple's marketing efforts aside, it's going to have to be people like you and me that help all these new switchers figure out their newly complicated landscape. Just when we thought maybe the world was just going to all quietly switch to the Mac at a nice trickle and we could all just sit back and wait for it to happen, the game's gone and changed, and suddenly we're perhaps more needed than ever.

Because there's going to be a whole lot more Mac users now than any of us could ever have predicted. Despite the fact that having Windows on your Mac in most cases actually makes for a significantly worse experience, the security blanket of having the Windows option there as a fallback is going to push Mac sales through the roof. Nevermind that there's nothing logical about it. None of these people used logic when they made the mistake of choosing Windows in the first place. But now that they know that they have the option of continuing their mistake on a Mac, they're going to come rushing in like nothing we've ever seen. Forget forty percent year over year growth Ð think four hundred percent. Think about a fourth of the people around you using a Mac within four years.

But try not to think about how messy it's going to be. Try to ignore the patently offensive advertisements you'll see on TV in which Apple explains that you can now run Windows natively on your Mac. Try to be gracious when the people around you begin asking idiotic questions about running Windows on a Mac. Just hold your nose to block out the offensive odor of it all, and keep in mind that a lot of these folks are going to be using a Mac, and real soon. And once they go ahead and buy their Mac, start thinking of ways to help convince them to keep it Windows-free.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go vomit, and then go buy a whole lot of Apple stock.